Hidden Rose Apple®

If you have posters of oompa loompas wallpapering your cubicle, then this is the fruit for you!

I first posted about this apple in November of 2009, back in the wee early days of my sweet site’s existence. I picked up a new batch of these this week though and just had to post an update. If you can find these, definitely pick some up. I know Specialty Produce has a few now if you happen to be in San Diego!

APPEARANCE Rating:

AROMA Rating:

This is the strongest smelling apple I have ever been around. I have about ten of them, and the sweet, appley, cotton candy fragrance keeps sneaking over and tickling my nose. They smell crazy good.

TEXTURE Rating:

The first time I tried these a few years ago, the texture was just so-so. Some were relatively crisp, but some weren’t and they all melted in to a mealy bite. Definitely not my favorite texture. But this batch was all crisp and delightful! Moral here – make sure and get them fresh, keep ’em cold and don’t wait too long to eat them. (as if you wouldn’t bust these out at the first chance you had to show them off.)

TASTE Rating:

A little bit tart, a little bit sweet, a little bit blah. They basically remind me of a grocery store Red Delicious but with a little more tartness. They also leave a slightly filmy or tannic taste.

OVERALL Overall Rating:

So I would never buy this apple again if it was normal looking – meaning if it had white or beige flesh. They are good, but not great. But it is very clearly NOT normal and so I am hooked for life. I mean if you want to be the instant cool aunt or uncle, whip one of these out for the kiddies at your next family get-together. Tell them its magic or blood or a Barbie apple! Bring it along with a Willy Wonka DVD. You can not go wrong here. Trust me. Plus the taste is fine, the smell divine, (yes I like to rhyme), and the texture and aftertaste problems go away when you cook them for some time (ha).

FRUIT

Apple

VARIETY

Kimzey-Newell (Hidden Rose(TM))

PEAK

Fall-Winter

ORIGIN

Origin

GROWN

PURCHASED

NOTES

This apple has only been commercially available for the last few years. It is one of many red-fleshed varieties. This variety is actually Kimzey-Newell or Airlie Red Flesh with Hidden Rose Apple® as the registered trademark name. Various internet reviews of this apple (largely by people selling it) indicate it is a great snacking apple and that it tastes like strawberry lemonade. I’m thinking they are drunk with love for the pinkness of it because I don’t think it tastes one bit like lemonade, but I’m no lemonade expert.

Also, I am posting a candied apple recipe that uses black candy that would be soooooo cool with these pink apples. (You should definitely at least look at that picture – spooky and awesome.) I know it isn’t halloween anymore and most of you are thinking about Christmas and Hanukkah now, but I can’t help it – I LOVE HALLOWEEN. And I guess you could adjust and do red and green apples, which could be cool too – not as cool, but still cool.

RECIPES

3 Comments

Janice
on December 11, 2009 at 11:38 pm

The fruit maven was at my house with this apple and we wondered if it would bake well so she made a very simple apple crisp with with a oatmeal/brownsuger/cinamin topping. Popped it in the oven for breakfast and it was divine with fresh coffee. Not too sweet, wonderful flavor, and made us all happy we were up so early.
I will use this apple for baking from now on.

I tried this variety recently, and in my estimation, not bad, but actually a bit bland compared to other pink-fleshed varieties. The outstanding ones, at least in my neck of the woods (SF Bay Area) are Pink Pearl (very early season, coinciding with the earliest Gravensteins) and the later season (and even harder-to-find) Grenadine. These are both *intense* tart apples (absolutely no “a little bit blah” to them), but if grown to sufficient ripeness, having a nice counterbalancing sweetness, and some really nice berry or “rose” element to its flavor that I keep thinking is in some way related to their anthocyanin coloring. Outstanding with a nice La Tur or similar cheese. Absolutely two of my favorite apples, and ones I look forward to each year.

Like the Hidden Rose, Pink Pearls need to be purchased and refrigerated ASAP after harvest, and consumed within a week or two, as flavor and texture can go south very quickly. Grenadine seems to hold up a little better, but I haven’t pushed it.